What if
by Ndara
Summary: Show-verse, a "missing" scene, set during 01x03. Westerosi books tell stories of courtly love; is it possible for a Khaleesi? Rated M for sexual content. UST. Jorah M./Daenerys T.


The lamp burning by her bed spat and reeked of rancid tallow, yet Daenerys kept turning the pages. Her handmaidens were running out of chores and, exhausted, longed to be dismissed and go to sleep, and their Khaleesi seemed to be completely lost in her book and paid no heed to them.

It was one of the books Ser Jorah Mormont gave her on her wedding day. Worn yellow pages sang of gruesome and glorious past, of maesters and knights, distant northern lands and exotic beasts, of kings and queens. Queens who ruled, who led their people to victory when their husbands were slain. Queens wise and strong who brought up their sons leading by example. And queens who loved the ones they wed, or queens who kept their marriage political and took lovers…

Daenerys glumly wondered what that must be like. What's that like to be with someone you love, someone gentle and caring, someone who doesn't smack his lips when a man's belly gets ripped open before his eyes during his wedding feast and someone who doesn't enjoy a man's intestines dumped in the dust before his young bride? Someone considerate. Someone who would actually treat her with some respect, like a human being and not like a filly.

Fillies and stallions, mating and breeding… The news of her pregnancy left her both relieved and terrified. Women often died in childbirth, her own mother died that way, yet it was a blessing, a proof of new Khaleesi's worth. A barren queen is no queen, often dealt with in most unpleasant ways even in societies much more civilized than the Dothraki.

And then there was something else. Suppose she _would_ take a lover like those queens in the books. At least, in her dreams, she could. Before it was completely impossible, and now… She would not get any more pregnant than she was now, right?

But who could it be? She was surrounded by her husband's subjects, and favouring one of them would be completely insane, and, as far as she had already learned their ways, taking lovers was just something the Khaleesis ididn't/i do. Not if they wanted to live. Khals used to share their wives with their bloodriders, but that was quite another matter. Things seemed to be easier across the Narrow Sea, and, though adultery was punished by law, if the woman was powerful enough, many were likely to turn a blind eye. Take Queen Cersei. She was not in the book, but, back at Pentos, Daenerys heard rumours of her long affair with her own brother, and she still remained the usurper's queen all the while.

Daenerys sighed. Her mind wandered over the Narrow Sea, to the capital of the Seven Kingdoms she had never seen and farther to the North.

Ser Jorah Mormont was from the North. What was his opinion on the subject, she wondered, blushing with shame.

There was a day, almost right after her wedding, when she was so sore of the riding she was not used to, that she all but fell from her saddle when the Khalasar stopped for the night. Ser Jorah was there for her, quick and alert, like the best squire one could wish for. He helped her off her horse and gave her over to her handmaidens. The way his big hands, his strong arms held her, the way he smelled… Of course, both of them did not smell like roses, yet beneath all the sweat, and dust, and horses, and leather there was an intangible something that made her knees weaken, and now she wondered if he felt the same way. What if…

No, no, no! Should anyone know what she was thinking, it could cost Mormont his life, or worse, much, much worse.

And yet, who could prevent her from dreaming a little?

Doreah taught Daenerys how to prepare herself for her husband, so that it would not hurt so much. What that would be like if it was her lover who took his time to awaken her body for him, to tease her, to make sure she would enjoy the act of love? Doreah was gentle, skillful and eager to please, but Daenerys wanted a more masculine touch, someone strong and confident in a manly way. Hard lips, broad shoulders… scratchy beard… Someone with the energy and grace of a barely tamed wild beast and with the bearing of a knight from the ballads at the same time. And, most of all, someone who genuinely wanted her and wanted her to want him back, not someone bought to do all that.

Did ihe/i?

And even if he didn't want her that much, so what? She was a queen, after all. Ordering men about – that's what queens do. In books. Maybe she could just come to his tent in the middle of the night and order him. He was sworn to serve; well, let him serve, then. She knew it was all wrong, completely impossible, but she just let her imagination run wild. According to Viserys, she was of great value, beautiful enough to buy an army ten thousand strong. No man would turn her down.

So, she wouldn't even have to give any orders. She would just stand before him, looking deep into those eyes, oh so blue, let her garments drop on the ground and take a few steps towards him. He would gasp and sit up, not yet sure that it was not a dream, bewildered and struggling for breath, and she would kneel and crawl over him and let the sensitive tips of her breasts brush his lips.

And he would seize his chance, no questions asked. His hands would slide around her waist and then up her back to bring her breasts closer to his mouth, and he would worship her, and then cradle her neck in his palm to bring their lips together in one of those kisses they wrote about in books. He would be passionate, yet tender, playful, yet fiery, unhurried, like they have all the time in the world just for kissing. And he would wait for her to grab his hand and guide it between her thighs, and he would growl into the kiss finding her so wet, and hot, and ready for him. And then he would ask in that low rasp of his, nay, he would beg, wild with ravenous lust and longing, yet so afraid that she would leave if he dared to go any further: "My Queen?" Or, better still: "Khaleesi?"

And she would order him in her best queenly voice: "Take off your clothes, Ser, and pleasure me."

And then he would do something that neither Doreah, nor her husband, nor the books gave her any idea of. There must have been something more, something inconceivably satisfying, breathtaking, something all those knights and ladies in songs and stories were ready to give their life for. Maybe he knew what it was, maybe he would show her. She knew she wanted to know it before she died. And she wanted to hope that this man could help her catch but a glimpse of it at least.

She put the book aside and blew out the lamp. That night her husband didn't come to visit, yet sleep eluded her and she was thrashing about on her bed, exposing her body to Mormont's eager mouth in her imagination, with softest sighs and moans she could not help. Doreah and Irri played polite indifference, exchanging naughty smiles on the sly. Finally Daenerys drifted off, and her dreams were filled with wildest things, him, aching for her, burning with lust, but oh so sweet and subtle, and her, hungry and shameless in her surrender. In those dreams he loved her, adored her, brought her pleasure like nothing she had known before. And she loved him.

In the morning, back in her saddle, as usual, she absent-mindedly rode on with the Khalasar, musing over the most haunting memories of her dream and blushing a bit, and wondering if he would be able to guess her thoughts by looking at her.

The knight of her dreams was nowhere to be seen, though. Daenerys pretended to take interest in something down the road and asked the rider closest to her what it was. Then she addressed Doreah who walked beside her horse: "No, I don't understand a word he's saying. Bring Ser Jorah Mormont!"

Rakharo rode up to her and said: "He left last night, Khaleesi, for Qohor. He said that he would catch us later."

Pity.

Yet, perhaps, it was for the best after all.


End file.
